Tuesday, 28 December 2010

Mark's preliminary drawings are unreal... but as tattoos, they are insanely and infinitely better.

It's hard to believe that there are clients that come in and actually say, "So, when I come down for my appointment, are you just gonna tattoo it without a drawing or will you draw something first?" REALLY!?

The bottom line is... tattooing is not a game of chance and it should never ever be. We don't put the needle in until the client ok's the image and the placement of the image. Preliminary drawings are usually done in most cases. The ones you see in this blog are just some examples. You will see black line, and some blue pencil.

Look how good these are, and they are only the lines... when they are color pieces or shaded pieces, they will look a million times better. Look how awesome these are already!

Aron has a good collection of prelims on the go.. sleeves, backs.. large pieces.

Drawings never show how the tattoo will actually look finished because it's impossible to get the same smoothness or textures when drawing with a pencil as you would tattooing on skin with sharp needle groupings which have way more versatility than a graphite pencil or colored pencil wearing down on a textured white piece of paper.

Sasha stashes all her drawings... only found a few on her work area. Great sh*t. Look at the giant t*ts on the warrior woman.. hot.

When it comes to specific images, stencils have to be used. If a client asks for a portrait, or a logo... it would be silly for ANY artist to try and draw their rendition of that image, freehand. That's why, when portraits or logos come in, we ask for clients to bring us laser copies of their images so we can trace over them on stencil paper to get all the subtle shades, lines, eyelashes... lip texture, wrinkles, shades in the eyes as well as highlights and not miss a thing.

It would suck to have a portrait of your loved one end up with crooked eyes! There is a scientific and and specific technique to achieving perfect portraits, it's never a crap shoot at the Funhouse.

Juan's mirror is covered with blanket of drawings!

Whether we draw on paper, or whether we draw directly on the skin with a pen, the results are always unbelievable. Everyone here is an incredible artist. So versatile and so accommodating. We still say "there is nothing we can't tattoo!"

Saturday, 18 December 2010

Entrepreneurs: Eric Olson and Al Boyce, dedicated home brewers with day jobs--Olson teaches business at Normandale Community College in Bloomington, Minn., and Boyce is a computer programmer for U.S. Bank in St. Paul, Minn.

What Possessed Them: A fellow home brewer e-mailed Olson a photo of a crazy-looking pub on wheels in Europe. "I said, ‘Damn, this is one of the coolest things I've ever seen in my life.'" He tracked down the creators--brothers Henk and Zwier van Laar in (where else?) Amsterdam--and asked how to make one. They sold him one instead.

"Aha" Moment::In 2007, they got the first PedalPub rolling and sent e-mails out to friends and family, expecting a mild reaction. "But our e-mail list started to explode," Olson says. "And that's when I had the first inkling that this might be really successful."

Startup: Savings and home-equity loans covered the $40,000 to buy their first PedalPub, plus $20,000 to buy a van, a trailer, insurance, storage and marketing materials.

Pedalmania: Olson and Boyce have six PedalPubs in the Twin Cities, one in Houston, plus licensees in Austin, Texas; Nashville, Tenn.; Lawrence, Kan., and Milwaukee; plus, one sold to Amstel Light.

Customers: Birthday parties, corporate events, even a wedding. Most are women--68 percent.

Vital Stats: PedalPubs weigh 2,340 pounds empty (without beer or drinkers) and have a top speed of 5 mph. They seat 10 pedalers, a bartender and a driver and rent for $160 to $190 per hour, BYOB.

2011 and Beyond: They plan to franchise the concept next year. Says Olson, "I'd love to see 500 of these things all over the country."

Sunday, 12 December 2010

Mommy, is there really a Santa Claus? Why did Billy’s mom say there isn’t a Santa? If you haven’t heard these questions yet, you likely will as the little ones grow and begin to question the antics and even the sheer existence of the jolly old elf. Would you like to be able to offer a bit of proof to an inquiring little mind? Wouldn’t we all like to prolong the magic of Santa Claus even one more year? iCaughtSanta.com lets parents not only put an end to the questions and doubt—but, create a memorable photo of Santa caught in the act in a child’s very own home!

Meeting Santa at the mall or the local toy store rarely puts a child’s questions to rest. Imagine, instead, being able to offer a color photo of Santa literally caught in the act of delivering holiday joy in the child’s own living room or perhaps descending the fireplace in the little ones very own home. iCaughtSanta.com helps visitors create a unique keepsake photo of Santa inside the child’s home by combining site provided digital images of Santa Claus with a user’s uploaded digital photo as the background. Want a photo of Santa by the Christmas tree—or bending down to pet the family dog? With 20 different Santa poses from which to choose, visitors can select a wide variety of poses to coordinate with personal background photos.

Yes, tech savvy parents or photographers may be able to accomplish such a photo creation with a variety of software tools—but, for many of us, the time and effort involved is a bit too much at such a busy time of the year. iCaughtSanta.com makes it easy. In three simple steps visitors to iCaughtSanta.com can upload a holiday scene—such as a shot of the fireplace or the Christmas tree, add an iCaughtSanta.com offered image of Santa Claus and print it either at home or have it printed at participating retailers. Photos can also be shared via email, Facebook or on Twitter.

iCaughtSanta.com uses Adobe Flash technology to create custom images from user uploaded photos combined with one of the 20 Santa images available on the site. The site is designed with three easy steps in mind—but, users are able to take advantage of advanced settings to rotate and move the Santa overlay image, or adjust the size, brightness and color of both the chosen Santa and the uploaded holiday background to be sure that the Santa image matches the digital photo.

These make really cute keepsake gifts for grandchildren or nieces and nephews as well. Last-minute shoppers can also purchase Gift Cards and eGift Certificates for loved ones with children, making iCaughtSanta.com photos a unique gift idea even if you aren’t a parent yourself. If Santa doesn’t visit a child in your life—check out some of the other beloved childhood characters such as the Tooth Fairy available at iCaughtacharacter.com—the home site for iCaughtSanta.

Wednesday, 8 December 2010

Twitter and Facebook users are familiar with URL shorteners, the web tools that turn long and unwieldy links into short, shareable ones. Bristol-based shrtn is adding to that concept by helping social media users earn some extra cash while sharing product links.

Like other shorteners, shrtn has a simple interface that lets users enter long URLs, which are then shortened to something like http://shrtn.co/hb (linking, in this case, to Steven Johnson's Where Good Ideas Come From). The big difference with other services is that shrtn has signed up with over a hundred online merchants, and adds affiliate identifiers to their URLs. Ever time an item is purchased through a registered user's shortened link, shrtn receives a commission and passes part of that on to the user.

So if someone short-links to their favourite perfume on Beauty.com, and one of their friends follows that link and buys from Beauty.com, the user receives a cut of the affiliate earnings (shrtn pays out 70–80% of the total commission). Users receive their earnings through PayPal, or can choose to donate them to charity, in which case shrtn adds an additional 20% on top.

By simplifying affiliate marketing for ordinary consumers and keeping the experience unobtrusive for those who click on links (it doesn't add pop-ups or insert elements into the user's browser) shrtn seems like a win-win for all involved.

Saturday, 4 December 2010

Centralized storage in the “cloud” is becoming an increasingly ubiquitous option for consumers' digital belongings, but tangible goods are still typically hauled off to expensive self-storage units when they can't be accommodated at home. New Jersey-based StorageByMail is a company that aims to change that, however, with a service that lets clients send their possessions through the mail to the company's central warehouse for flexible offsite storage.

Similar in many ways to Garde Robe's service for clothes and Dorm2Dorm's solution for college students' possessions, StorageByMail maintains a world-class storage facility that's also used by brands including Bloomingdale's and Tommy Hilfiger. Customers of the service begin by creating an account and an online description of any package of goods they'd like to send into storage. Next, they print a custom, prepaid USPS shipping label for each box they'd like to send; for users on the go, there's even a mobile app to send a label to the nearest fax machine. Either way, those labels ensure safe passage for the goods through the U.S. Postal Service to StorageByMail's warehouse. When the customer wants them back, he or she simply requests return delivery and the company will ship them out the next business day. Storage pricing ranges from USD 4.99 per month per cubic foot for a pay-as-you-go option to USD 249 per month for an annual plan including 100 boxes of any size and free return-trip shipping. For consumers with just a single box to store, there is no charge. A video on YouTube explains StorageByMail's concept in further detail.

We've already noted on many occasions the ownership-averse nature of today's transumers, who don't want to be tied down with possessions when they aren't currently using them. Mobile consumers, however, are likely to find StorageByMail's location-independent service equally compelling, as are space-strapped urban dwellers. One to partner with or emulate in your part of the world?